Banner upgrade: system downtime and briefing sessions
Student records system Banner will be unavailable for several days later this month while it undergoes a vital upgrade.
Student records system Banner will be upgraded later this month
Banner will be switched from version 8 to 8x, resulting in system downtime from the morning of Friday 19 July to the end of Monday 22 July. There will be no access to the system during this time.
During graduation, a cloned system will be in place for the graduation and exams teams so they can make any last minute changes to the programme. This information will then be entered into the new system once the transition is complete.
PGR record system GRAD will also be available during the same period, however live updates from Banner will not be in operation from 19-22 July.
“There is never a good time for Banner to be out of action but these dates were chosen to attempt to minimise disruption,” said Catherine Lorigan, Director of Student Operations.
“Performing this interim upgrade will mean that we can significantly minimise the downtime later in the year when we upgrade to Banner 9. Of course, we realise this comes right in the middle of graduation, and therefore contingency arrangements will be put in place to protect the smooth running of the ceremonies.”
When users log back in to Banner after the upgrade, they should see no noticeable changes in user experience as this is an interim step before we switch to Banner 9 at the end of the year. All Banner users will receive training on the new system before then.
Testing of Banner 8x is still in progress and there is a small chance the upgrade might not go ahead if the project team is not 100% confident it will be a success. If any issues arise during the upgrade that could present a risk to ‘business as usual’, the upgrade will be aborted and we will revert to Banner 8.
All Banner users will be kept updated and informed if there is any change to the plan.
Please email the Student Lifecycle Programme team if you have any concerns or questions. Briefing sessions are being held from 1-2pm on Tuesday 9 and 3.30-4.30pm on Wednesday 10 July to cover any issues. All Banner users will receive an invitation shortly. Follow the above hyperlinks for further information on our Events pages.